Strange Isn't It?
by kissoftheblackrose
Summary: Jill's been observing Eustace acting strange in the real Narnia. Confused as to why, Jill decides to confront him on it. I think I would describe this pretty much as fluff. Inform me if it sucks. EustaceXJill Takes place after the Last Battle.


Strange Isn't It?

Jill gracefully strode down the hill to the gorgeous beach of the new, or shall I say _real_ Narnia. Her long lost sense of balance had apparently found its home and given Jill the grace and poise she could only wish for before coming there. She'd seen Eustace wandering around on the beach a while before looking rather bewildered. It was so odd because it seemed impossible to be in a bad mood there, so Jill decided to see what was wrong, that is, _if_ anything was really wrong.

Eustace had been found sitting in the sand close enough to the water for it to soak his boots. He still looked bewildered, as if he was working out a rather difficult algebra problem. Jill approached him from behind. She considered scaring him, but thought better of it.

"Eustace," she said gently, warning him of her presence. Eustace turned and smiled at her.

"What's up?" he asked. Jill huffed. _As if he didn't already know,_ she thought.

"Why are you sitting here by yourself?" she returned the question with one of her own. The smile disappeared from her friend's face and Jill suddenly felt guilty. Turning away, Eustace placed his chin onto his hands that rested on the ends of his knees. However, he did not answer. Jill sighed and promptly sat next to her colleague in the sand.

Eustace had been a wonderful friend for the last few years they'd spent on earth. What was odd about it was that in the first few months of their acquaintanceship he'd been particularly horrid to her. He was always being an irritant to his peers, but somehow Jill had always known that it was simply to impress _them._ To save his own skin. Yet only a few weeks after, when the holidays had been over for nearly a month, he managed to have caught up with Jill again. She could remember observing his actions from afar and wondering just what had happened to him. Still, she avoided speaking with him. Sometimes she would see him giving a particularly strange look at her while in class. She thought it looked apologetic, but she ignored it. No use in falling for a particularly nasty trick and having to spend a few days, maybe a couple of weeks, at the mercy of _their_ verbal abuse.

Then it happened. Jill had been having a terrible day, and someone saw her mood and how downtrodden she looked. _They_ caught wind of it and decided to make her day even worse. Jill ran away from them and hid behind the experiment house. There she found Eustace, who'd been hiding too. Never did she expect to be called into Narnia to find a long lost prince whose father even had to call off searches to save the lives of the adventurers. Never did she expect to change and grow more confident in herself. Never did she expect to gain a dear friend in the process. Eustace didn't expect it either.

Yet, when they returned, the two were practically inseparable. Each defended the other from everything. (_They_ were expelled after… the lion incident.) Rumors of course spread around the school like wildfire about Eustace and Jill, but the two allies ignored them as if they were completely irrelevant. Nothing existed between the two other than a strong bond of friendship. They treated each other like brother and sister. Nothing more. Nothing less. Jill though, had been getting odd thoughts in her head ever since she returned to Narnia.

How odd had it been for Eustace to worry about her when she disappeared to get Puzzle from the stable. Why would he send her weird looks in the lookout tower when they weren't even doing anything? Even stranger was how he hugged her when she started crying upon seeing the monstrosity known as Tash. The only comfort she took in her embarrassment was that it seemed as if Eustace was almost as scared of it as she was. (Though he managed to refrain from balling his eyes out like an idiot as she had.) Then later, she'd noticed that he sighed with relief when King Tirian had told her to stay a ways away from the fight and simply fire arrows. After when she was shoved through the stable door, Eustace was there to greet her with another hug. Yet… she seemed to be doing the same sort of things towards him. In fact she almost _enjoyed_ the concerned gazes and the, what she assumed to be, friendly embraces. The assessments Jill was making were started to confuse her considerably.

Eustace still sat silently, the warm sun on his exposed neck, and the salty water grazing his leather boots. Jill resigned herself to staring across the ocean. Her hazel eyes closed up on the lone islands and she speculated silently that she should visit there soon. Finally she heard Eustace sigh and chuckle.

"What is it?" she asked.

"It's just been so strange," Eustace blurted. Jill cocked an eyebrow.

"Well I would've thought you would be used to strange by now," the girl speculated. "With traveling to another world _twice_ and saving _two_ members of the same royal family _and all_ within two different time periods even though you hardly aged at all."

"I'm not talking about us being in heaven," Eustace rolled his eyes. Jill shrugged. Surprisingly none of them had been bothered at the concept of being dead.

"Then what in Aslan's name are you getting at?" Jill huffed, more than a little frustrated with her friend.

"Well… lately I've been having these strange thoughts," Eustace answered. Jill's copper optics widened at the answer.

"Go on," she told him, a bit too eagerly.

"Well I've recently taken into note of how much you've helped me in the past," Eustace said, staring at the sky as if he was laughing at himself. Jill cocked an eyebrow. "How you always keep me in line, with or without force." Jill blushed at that. She could recall giving him a couple of really horrid bruises. "How you manage to make me watch what I say when I'm around you." At that, the girl gave him a confused look. There was nothing to give her a note of Eustace watching his words. And only around her too! "How I learned to watch over someone other than myself." Jill's shoulders were dropping in shock. _What is he saying?!_ She thought in what was almost hope.

"How strange that the person to teach me to not worry over my own skin so much as someone else's wouldn't even be a member of my family," he thought out loud, mostly to himself. Jill could only stare at her friend in shock.

"Is… that all?" she asked, practically afraid of the answer.

"No," Eustace laughed and finally turned towards his dearest friend. "For the past few days I've had the strangest urge to do this." With that he leaned in closer to Jill, placing a hand firmly on the nape of her neck, and gently pressed his lips onto hers in a sweet and innocent kiss.

Only a few short seconds lasted until Eustace pulled away with a smile, as if he was still mocking himself. Jill simply stared at him at a loss for words. "Strange isn't it?" he asked, turning to look back at the ocean.

"Yes that is strange," Jill answered finally, "but not as strange as this." She shifted to sit on her knees in the sand and Eustace looked at his friend. He was shocked to watch her lean in this time and fully place her own lips against his unsuspecting ones. This one was a little more passionate. Eustace was only sitting in shock just as Jill had, therefore handicapping him so to keep him from returning it. Breaking apart once more Jill smiled.

"I've wanted to do that too."


End file.
